By the way, you and links in your sig gave me some good intro to flatland. Me = flatland ignorant.

Thanks Ken.

Flatland is one of those niche things in BMX that is very small. It used to be that if you were a "freestyler" you rode flatland, vert, street... all of it. Like I did BITD. Unfortunately, it has broken off so much that the flat/street frames have gotten so different geometry-wise, you just have to pick a side.

I personally ride a 20" "all-purpose" frame that I can do everything on, just like BITD. I'm old school, though.

My skills are very, very, VERY basic compared to what the flat riders are doing now. They are AMAZING and most ride brakeless. Here is Adam Kun... an average pro flatlander

uuuhhhmmm, no you can't. Until you show me a proof that you can carry 15 people on your shoulders while you are on your bike I say you can't

The summer of 1988 in Santa Cruz, Ca. Get a group of 13 and 14 year old boys with too much testosterone and time on their hands and a lot of bad things happen. Think Beavis and Butthead on BMX bikes.

I don't think we did the 15 people thing, but we definetely would see how many BMX'ers and skaters we could fit on a bike. Oh, and our halfpipe that we built... did I ever mention that 14 year olds should not be building large structures? It was also a thing to ride off house roofs to flat. I really don't know how we lived through all that.

I really miss those BMX days. No worries... it was free pedalling. No internet to distract us or tell us how to ride and what's right or wrong, what's cool to wear or how light our bikes should be. There was no fashion except whatever we wore that day. We broke parts daily; it was all crap but we loved it. Paul at Rock Lobster welded 990 brake tabs on our bikes and we were some of the first BMX freestylers to use 990 brakes on our bikes. We also stripped our axle pegs so much that one time we heard that a guy was welding big washers on the end of steel tubing, and that was the beginning of the current foot peg you see now. We'd use as many MTB parts on our BMX bikes becasue BMX parts were just built so horribly.

We used to do improptu "shows" down at the beach and flirt with all the surfer betties. We'd bust rolling hang-5's (rolling on the front wheel, front foot on the peg) in front of girls to try and impress them. We'd bunnyhop on top of old junk cars and roll over the tops of them and jump off he back. I'd 360 off picnic tables. It was a crazy time and we had zero fear.

Sometimes when I'm riding, I get that same buzz I did when I was a BMX teen. Even tonight I was riding my fixed gear and it took me back to when we'd ride BMX at night and really felt like we were getting away with something.

Thats a real show of talent and madness! I hope they enjoy what they do, weren't many smiles going on from the riders!

Having just moved back from Beijing a year ago, I can tell you that the circus performers are typically poor children who are given to the circus at very young ages, like three years old. They've had lots of practice to do this. As a matter of fact, it's unusual to not be so you to join the Chinese circus. It's just a job to make money.

Check out Jackie Chan's life story. He was one such child. And look what he can do.